Pro ‘Overwatch’ Team Manager Reveals Grueling 72-Plus-Hour-a-Week Training Schedule

Overwatch League team Shanghai Dragons have lost 32 games in a row since its debut in January. Fans are understandably unhappy about the team’s performance. Manager Yang Van posted a letter on TwitLonger Monday addressing their concerns and revealed the team’s grueling training schedule.

“We have the most intensive training scheme among all the teams, ever since we arrived last December,” he wrote. “Our daily schedule starts at 10:30 a.m. as we leave for training facilities and return to our houses around 10:30 to 11:00 p.m., with a possible training extension to 12:00 a.m.; we train six days a week with one day off. During mid-stages, we have 3-4 days off depends on other teams’ schedule (if we can have scrims with them).”

“This is how intensive we train in U.S. We ask all our players to give everything in training, but we also let players relax however they want during off days,” Van added.

Van also said a recent investigation into how team members spend their down time “confirmed some issues” inside the team that the organization is now handling, but he didn’t provide further details. “We will announce it once it’s done,” he said.

Considering the Shanghai Dragons’ dismal record, one has to wonder if 72-hour-a-week training sessions are really helping the team. But, Van said the team understands how important training is and how devoted it should be, and he apologized for its recent losses.

“We deeply understand the hope we bear on our shoulders,” he said. “We are never the people that give up or let up easily. We will continue to give everything in our training, and remain thirsty of improvement and victory, on which we are going to work to make it happen inch by inch.”

The Shanghai Dragons’ next match is Thursday, May 24 against the Philadelphia Fusion.

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